China Mug Fragments
by Shiggity Shwa
Summary: Sometimes life doesn't go exactly as planned. Mistakes make the greatest surprises but sometimes that surprise goes unnoticed until it's too late. AU Season 5. Sam/Jules. Jules' POV. Rated M for adult situations.


_A/N: Just a oneshot I really wanted to write. Sorry if you were waiting for an update on a different story. School's been hell. _  
_Just for fun and because I'm sure I'll receive crap from someone if I don't mention that obviously since this is an M-rated story it's dealing with adult related themes and since it's me it has swear words.  
A tentative thank you to those who read, review, and favorite.  
_

**Disclaimer: I own nothing**

China Mug Fragments

Spotless dishes ring round the marbled counter. Clack and stack atop each other. Timber and sway in a contained atmosphere. The arid offering of a dusty heater expels curls of hot air like sour breath off a green tongue. Kicks on first like the bass drum in a marching band or the internal coils of a metal water cooler.

"Want to go out for dinner tonight?"

He leans against the counter like a sawed tree. Rotten from the trunk and cracked, recently fallen and stuck on the embracing branches of forest brethren. An arboreal support system. Only half invested as she empties the dishwasher. Eyes glued to his phone because of some recent family drama. Natalie and his Dad. Emily and his Mom. All of them and him. The whole messed up Braddock clan he hightailed it from with a muffler fuming puffs of guilt.

Extends her arm to retrieve the last dinner plate. Faux white china with a decorative blue border. An engagement present from Sarge. Said brides should get a set of china from someone and she wasn't an exception. Asked her not to use it before the wedding because it's bad luck. But their old dishes embarrassed. So chipped, and cracked, and stained with a lifetime of wrong turns. And no one ever gave her china before.

Her hand stammers, drops the moon fresh discus back into the washer slot. Pain corrupts her torso, her pelvis. Threshers inside. Swirls the content and leaves her feeling entirely empty in every facet. Muscles harden to coal, then diamonds. Threaten to punch through skin. Tear and spill more of that sweet, sweet blood she can't seem to stem.

Hand under her navel for the briefest blink of moments, she resettles. Exhales ebb the pain away. The flow omnipresent like the milk infused bad breath of an ancient jumbled boiler. The plate returns smooth under her fingers. So untainted, and thoughtful, and new. The ornamental design elevates in rivers on the ware, slicks under her thumb like ink. She promotes it atop a throne of nine other sibling dishes.

"No. I don't feel too great."

"Still?"

Not incredulous or upset. They're mostly homebodies even with a relationship exiting the nascent period. Concerned. His base denominating emotion is always concern. Factor in numerators as plentiful and varied as tossed beanbags in a barrel. Burning buildings, maniacs with guns, maniacs on the edge, car crashes, bombs, maniacs with bombs, maniacs with viruses, multiple maniacs with all the above. The concern might predetermine his love.

But the phone, the bickering family of Ma and Pa Braddock and two baby sisters, falls abandoned on the counter as the tree first grows roots, then legs and feet. He swings around to help her empty the top dishwasher drawer. Cups and mugs.

"I can do this. Go lie down."

Glass cup not so glassy. Fragmented in a thousand tiny pebbles. Soap spotted bubbles of cloudy gray. Dishwasher diseased. Not on her new plates. Her wedding china. "What did that guy say about our water heater?"

"He never called back." Intercepts the next cup in play. Hand, arm, body stronger, faster, healthier. Doesn't notice the bubbles. Doesn't care about the marring effect they have. How company perceives them. Sure they don't get company, but can't they have a few nice things. "Go lie down."

"Can you call the guy about the water heater so we can have showers?" Plunks capsized cup onto a cotton-threaded kitchen towel next to his, gaping maw opened like a hungry chick. Checkerboard pattern. Or is it chess. One step forward and two back.

"Fine. Go lie down and—"

"Sam, it's a period not an amputation." Hand clasps her hip in anger. Not really anger, more so irritation. Should've dealt with the water heater herself. But a creeping ache gnaws at the small of her back. Numbs her hips and the tops of her thighs. Ignites the carousel in her pelvis. Hand at her hip twitches lightly to imitate a massage.

"Okay. It's just—"Hand consumes his phone the way she veils her hip. The frozen pain needs to be hit and cracked to reveal a treat from the ice age. "You're not usually like this."

Not said with spite. Just spoken with truth. She's not usually like this. Contrary to the popular rumors and mythos at the SRU, when her once a month happens she becomes depressed. Withdraws into herself and exists only as a functioning shell. Eats the bare minimum, sleeps the bare minimum and when not on duty, speaks less than a typed page of words.

Has cramps, but not this bad. Stands stationary but empty chested like she ran up twenty flights of stairs. The Tylenol she snuck while patrolling with him doesn't even factor in. Doesn't even eat up a slice of the pain pie. Finally after passenger's chair fidgeting imposed by cramps and backaches she told him what was wrong. Chagrined and face flushed. His response was concern.

Half a conversation ignites in the living room. He paces the length of the couch, cups the phone to his ear like a conch. Talking to the sea. Trying to wheedle it into swinging by and repairing the water heater so they don't have to shower at work. A bunch of 'yeah's. A bushel of guttural signifiers.

Scoops up the final cup, a china mug from the wedding collection. White with the same blue paint, except instead of geometric designs, a false flower blooms. The idea of a flower in six points padded by six domes. The mugs are her favorite, might over drink hot liquids just so she can hold the heated ceramic in her hand.

The blender turns on blindly. Thought it was on before. On high before. A mere warning of what pain could be. Muscles thrust against each other. Clash like the dishes off each other. Like the mug she loves but whips to the kitchen tiles in roils of searing pain. The fractions of china glide across the floor. Under the island lip. Under drawbridge dishwasher. Under the edge of cupboards.

Body, like the mug, is empty. So empty, but full of hurt. Lungs practice the shallow repetitions of a frequently breaching swimmer. Both hands hold beneath her navel. The muscles packed, strained against each other unnaturally. Waging war unnaturally. Churning and spewing. Spewing forth what. Back of her neck cools and flames in the heat. The room wobbles like a record being fitted to a turn table. Left side up, right side down. Spew and knows.

Fingernails tap onto the metallic sink clear of dish and cloth. Mouth spews forth something too. Lunch. A chicken wrap from a downtown bistro in the area they patrolled, water, coffee, and a Tylenol. Floats in chunks and boils in the sink. A burgundy colored stew gurgling around the drain.

Head sways to the edge of the sink. The border of marble and metal. The rancid wilting of stomach acid and a nasty old boiler somehow laced with tin from the sink. Lingers like a handful of change.

Warmth shimmies the muscles on her lower back. Stretches and relaxes. Extinguishes the violent flame of compression and oppression by a graze. Sacrifices his hand to a warzone. The Holy Land. "Come on."

Swallows the acrid lump of leftovers congealing on the fat of her tongue. Rolls her head gently at the border. "No."

"Yep. Come on."

"No." Can't. Can't leave the tile. The mark on the tile where feet slobber sweat stains. The moment she leaves it's real. It becomes reality. If she stays perching against the sink, leaning against the sink like a fallen tree on comrades, then perhaps it was never true. "I can't."

Dept fingers unscrew her arms from the counter ledge. Force her to take an upright stance with his hand on her bicep as structural support. Feet cement in place. Wonders if he knows. If he even has an inkling. A clue. Some sort of biological inclination. "We should go to the hospital."

He has no idea. And she can't. Can't do it. Be the one to tell him. Smash fantasy upon fantasy on the ground like china mugs tonight. "I can't."

"Jules, this isn't normal."

"You don't know—"

"I grew up with two baby sisters. I've got a lifetime of second hand experience." Hands coax hers. Offer affection and the cousin sense of comfort. Thumbs trace over her fingers in a preset pattern, one he follows every night. Finger, dip, finger, dip. Until he reaches her fourth finger. The diamond displayed upon it. Flips it back and forth. The dial to a safe.

"I can't—"

"Jules—" Tugs her fingers, her hand slightly, but feet nail into place.

"I can't."

"How about you focus on me?" Steps back crunching personally priceless faux china under the soles of his shoes. Their arms hang at a distance before their bodies, fingers barely whisper against each other. "In three seconds I'm going to take a step back."

"Don't. Sam, I don't think—"

"One. Yes you can."

Her fingertips begin to tingle with the same contagious numbness that consumes her body. Abandoned. At a young age abandoned and rebuilt her life only to be completely abandoned down to smoky glassware and fractured mugs.

"Please. I—I can't take—"

"Two."

Slipping away. Just slipping away. Both. At that very moment. At that very minute. The distance increases between what she had and what she now has. Wants to crawl into last week. Cuddle against two Tuesdays ago.

"Sam, please."

"Three."

The pads of her feet peel away from the white tile. A toppling step jostles her innards. To the left. Then the right. Organs, muscles, bones, fluids all whorl around. Whisk together in a newfound, egg beaten emptiness. Feet are free of floor and care. Float around her with Hermes wings.

Crumbles. Physically remains upright with her biceps tuned to his hands. But emotionally, she's the mug. She's the spotted cup. Muscles release and tears stream easy from the pent up dams. Easy. It should've been easy.

"Are you okay?"

In an instant gathered and on the couch. The pads of her unflayed feet being examined with sniper keen eyes. Then the palms of her hands. His thumb attempts three times to swipe the sheen of tears from her cheeks, but the current proves faucet impressive. Then a hand stops to solid navel, and it hurts more. Not physically, but emotionally and into the future.

"It'll be okay."

"No it won't."

She lost it.

* * *

Spotless metal poles glimmer in the false light. Absorb electric rays and burp them up. Gray and white and bright in their little slice of the universe. An examination room. Clipped wings and caged from the rest of the hospital as she perches on the edge of the bed. Eyes heavy, so lead laden. Going to roll from their sockets and regurgitate the same dead light until they clack together under the sonosite machine.

He paces in a one man band of sounds. Hasn't stopped speaking, stopped moving since he slapped shoes and a coat on her and got her here. Still probable strides in the length of the couch. Phone crowded with familial and water heater problems stowed in his coat pocket. Sneakers yowl over the floor, leave black rubber stains. Hand tucks to his chin, then back at his side, then back to his chin in equal rhythm to rubber ruptures. Lips putter between his middle and index finger.

Pelvis packs around an invisible fist plowing into flesh and muscle. Ripples and solidifies. Food left out on the counter. Day old clay on an old farm porch. Deflates as lungs crave air, but she refuses to take that inhale. Like nicotine to a cigarette holder, refuses to take the next inhale. The pain skitters away with a thousand beady orange eyes. It trickles.

He's still pacing, still muttering like a madman on a downtown corner with a sign posting imminent doom. Limbs and turns wild. Smears her view. Body tips to the side like a buoy bouncing in the choppy sea. Head on a stiff, crunchy pillow. Closing lids darken his increasingly animalistic motions. "Can you please stay still? You're making me dizzy."

"Someone should've been in here by now." Shoes scream and she imagines how long the black eyebrows are on the once spotless, now filthy floor. In a little succession, like a line of kindergarteners, his shoes squeak across the floor as two mice. Shades her lids from the light. "You could have a blood clot."

"I don't have a blood clot."

"How do you know?" Sentence parsed with the high frequency of chair hooves shaving into the floor. Coat ruffles as he sits and he sighs while fishing her hand from her face. Battles the bangs from her eyes, and she wants to smile. But can't. Just tossed empty onto this gurney. Small of her back starts to grow branded against the metallic cruciform railing. "You could've bled out."

"It got us a room." Had a little leak in the waiting room. Nearing an hour into their arm chair journey she shifted the wrong way and the dam gates flooded. Hell Gates roared. Soaked her jeans like a jar of spaghetti sauce. He blanched, threw his coat around her waist and body guarded her to the triage nurse. She was—is beyond caring.

"This isn't funny." Fingers dabble and ramble on her cheek. Can't. Can't take the touch with the pain. The good with the bad. The strenuous outside braiding and stapling within. Spotless metal arches all reflecting the fake light just as well. The nonexistence.

Convulses. A dilution of their relationship. A dip into negative waters that coat her permeable skin and convolute perception, conscience and personality. Disengages from his breezy touch, bare legs hang from the bed while squirming back.

A backdraft of concern balmily wafts through the room. Hushes the prickling against winter paled skin and arms folding into a thin swathed, gaudy patterned chest. Heavy swallow quenches. Cake and cream from a dessert they should be eating. Settles in the chair, back straight. Arm cross and uncross immediately. Emit the waves of misconstrued emotion. Not angry. Concerned. Disguised as a topic change.

"What do you want me to do with your jeans?"

Generic white bag observes them from the corner as if court ordered. She disrobed in a cubby bathroom, risky business when body swaying motions elicit stripping wallpaper from within. Handed him single bits of clothing. Her sweater, her bra, boots, left sock, right sock, cranberry splotched jeans. She chucked her murder scene panties and received a new pair courtesy of the maternity ward, which is so fucking ironic she might cry.

He dutifully refolded each piece of clothing and slid them into the bag. The rustling of the plastic against fabric waves on a beach, the rain against their roof a few nights ago when it was warm enough not to snow. Couldn't face him, because he'd know and then what. Eventually he'd have to know, and what good was she.

Couldn't gaze at her own gray skied reflection because somewhere between the brimstone embering on her back and the shattered glass butchering her pelvis was a bassinet full of self shame. A light four knuckled rap at the thin door roused her from another sink stare. Wished she could swirl down the drain, into the pipes and away. Just away from existence and this.

"Throw them out." Smothers her face with her hand. Prefers a pillow because any second a doctor will march through that door, run some tests, do something to determine what exactly is falling out of her, and then he'll know. Something climbs up her back again, digging razor blades into flesh and bone. "Just throw the whole bag out."

"Are you sure? Your bra is fine and you love that sw—"

"I'm not going to be able to wear those after this. I'm not going to be able to look at those after this."

"What do you—"

"It's not just me. You're going to have to throw your clothes out too." Revolves to lie straight. Legs horizontal to the bed with a steady trickle unimpeded by a slight thigh clamp. Elbow bends to an apex, blinds the eyes of God interrogating through a fluorescent bulb above her head. "And rip up the tile in front of the sink in the kitchen."

"Jules, do you know what—"

There's a brisk knock and her arm plunges as the doctor enters the room, shutting the blind drawn door behind him. He's middle-aged with a little salt among his pepper hued receding hair. Bottled glasses slump on the tip of his nose magnifying his thin eyes.

"Julianna?" Voice dulcet. Misplaced for a hospital. For a rampant emergency room. From just her name, she knows he knows.

"Yeah."

"I'm Dr. Leung. I understand you—"

"We've been waiting almost two hours." Concern transfers to rage. Can't be furious with her because she's the one hurt. Furious with himself for not innately predicting her hurt. Like he should have some sort of sixth sense and just know. Instead channels his anger elsewhere.

"Sam." An exhale of his name. A warning. An exhaustion of her own body. A clue, he's not being chivalrous, he's being an idiot. A code. She knows too.

"I apologize for your wait, but arguing about the fact in passing is only going to waste time." The doctor wheels over a stool hidden away in a darken corner. The only one void of the tainted light. Roosts atop the seat and leans forward to engage them, her chart nestled in his lap. "Now, who are you?"

"I'm her fiancé."

"And it's okay with you if he's present during your examination?"

Before his finger even twitches with a shot of offended adrenaline, she drops a hand to his shoulder. Ignores the surge of pain cresting within her. Creaks a warped smile to her face for the sake of solace and appearances. "It's fine."

"Alright." The doctor agrees screening over her file briefly while Sam's chest deflates of hot air. His feathers align perfect, unruffled. Her hand ends up burrowed in his. His fingers tracing over hers. Finger. Dip. Finger. Dip. Ring spin.

"So you're experiencing a heavy painful menstrual flow?"

"Yeah." Answers to the door. The blotch on the door window. A previously tacked emblem or name. Letters pasted and scratched mercilessly away. A medical exam in someone's cleared office.

"When was your last menstruation?"

"Last month." But it was light. Two days light. Blamed stress. Long days, sleepless longer nights. Knew they needed a new hot water heater. Had some bad hot calls. Resulted in some close calls. Resulted in a big fight with him.

"Is there any chance you could be pregnant?"

His hand grows tenser around hers with each second of no response. Consumes it, ring and all. Sight clicks away from the sticky smudged window and directly into the eyes of the doctor. His pen doesn't tap the page hungering for an answer to consume paper. He lays it across her chart, a broken smile of pity on his face. Not anymore. "I honestly don't know how to answer that."

"Alright." The snap of her chart to the desktop rings louder as the empathy reenters his voice. "I'd like to do an ultrasound to make sure everything is normal, if that's okay with you?"

Head bounces once in a halfhearted nod. Eyes on the dappled window. Can't chance a glance to him because his hand slowly crumbles around hers. Beginning to catch onto the main plot. Beginning to put two and two together like they did some time ago which didn't mix right and nosedived.

Flaccid hand remains weakly clasping hers during the slopping of freezing gel. More negativity for her to absorb. Stimulates the muscles to contract. Angers the pelvis Gods of olden times and as the wand presses to her skin she winces. Like a truck tire to a tube of toothpaste.

Can't see the screen. The doctor angled it his way, and neither of them requested a joint view. After a few more brushstrokes from the doctor, the wand flees her pelvis, a barren place of hellfire and eternal pain. His expression indifferent as his feet hum over the floor, all squealing wheels, to retrieve her a few tissues to wipe off the gunk.

He wears the same slack jawed abyss stare during the entire event. From the word ultrasound, to the machine clicking on, to the drone of machine in the silent office, to the machine clicking off. Doesn't shudder or stutter. But his hand sweats, leaks when his eyes won't.

"Well the good news is you don't have a blood clot or a tumor or anything like that." Hand literally slides from his. Pops right out from the perspiration lubrication and he doesn't even notice. Maybe he's trying to decipher who needs an office in the emergency room or why they couldn't clean the mottled window properly.

"But the ultrasound did show evidence that you were pregnant."

Sweeps up the ooze from her stomach. Imagines bubbles boiling to the surface from her heat. From the heat within her. From the overexertion of every muscle trying to force everything out of her at once. He still doesn't twitch or talk.

"I'd estimate between ten to twelve weeks which poses a slight problem because your body can't complete the miscarriage naturally."

Tissue halts on her stomach. Fuses to the skin, bridges over her belly button fusing with the ooze. Too many shocking words in a single sentence. Like insult comics, or radio personalities. How she failed. Maternally, femininely. Didn't know she was carrying something—someone for that long. Never even had a fucking clue she was pregnant with her firstborn. Can't even complete the natural process of expelling it. The words deflect off of his cotton plugged ears.

"I'd like to send you upstairs for a procedure. It's quick and you can be home tonight."

Neither engages him with a reaction. The tissue wrinkles her stony stomach prematurely. Removes the site of a belly button. The thing which connects—would connect mother and child. Ten weeks. Eleven weeks. Twelve weeks. She didn't even know. Didn't even care to know. Selfishness and guilt overcome the shame.

"How about I give you a few minutes to talk?" Three light footsteps flutter over the floor before the door opens to an orchestra of mismatched noise. Crashing, bashing, smashing of people into things, things into walls.

The door clicks and the room swells with silence. Her brain uneven. Double-sided and in revolution. The majority wants to curl fetal, and sleep until her bones ache from ill movement. Run until the clumps and strings and clots in her underwear blend into a memory which might not exist. One her brain half erased to help her cope. The speck of other tells her this is irreversible. Crying and depression aren't going to rebuild anybody's body.

Right now the speck has control, because later she'll pile. Deconstruct into a puddle of sopping unease. Overreact for a day less than they recommend and then go back to work like nothing happened. But right now, someone has to pry the tissue papier-mâchéd to her stomach. Someone has to make a conscious decision about surgery. Someone has to remove themselves from the situation and be logical. Because he's not.

Rolls the tissue into a ball and tosses it across the room. Holds the flickering hope that perhaps his eyes might follow the trajectory, but they remain stagnant. Fixed on the wall, mind shut down, buried in a different world of what-ifs. But hands flex on the clock face. Wants to ask, but afraid of an answer. Something might happen, something more and she'd never know.

"Do you blame me?"

The purging of question soothes for only a moment, because the answer is hesitant. Then straining. Then waits longer as the second hand circles the clock face once more. Comatose, unknown if he hears her or not. Emotions burn bright like blue fire. Avoidance of her question until conscious and personality are fully restrained. Rehearsed so he doesn't flinch at her inability to care for their fetus.

Either way they wheel her upstairs. She doesn't kiss him or hug him. Doesn't touch him or look at him. Doesn't speak to him from the curtains of elevator doors when he finally stumbles onto the new plot twist. And she never gets an answer.

* * *

"Ms. Callaghan?"

A room. Different but so much the same as the last. Comparable to faux china plates received in a box set. A variation in pattern from flaw of human or machine, but still the same plates. Dim light glows from sconces potted on walls. Off white repainted an orange hue. Magnify blisters in the plaster. Little freckles and moles like soap deposits on glassware.

Heat floats the odor of sanitizer and burnt hair. Dust settling into radiator cracks and burned for fuel. Bare legs perspire under the thin blanket and sheet. Heels tunnel to yank the covers up from their roots. Sweat adheres polyester to her legs, but air finally swerves between her toes. The pain present but different. Empty but not barbed wire harsh. Small of her back isn't aflame, but stiff with internal burns.

"Ms. Callaghan?" A woman blocks the mouth of the privacy curtain shrouding her like a body being prepared for burial. Previous lapses of consciousness reveal nothing of a neighbor. Privacy curtain, in waves of aubergines and plums, adopts the attributes of an armored car. She can't see anything beyond a sea of purple.

"It's Jules." Wants to sit up. Hand plants into the stiff mattress but with no backboard to offer support, her bones liquefy. Slop her; leave her a big clot on a recovery bed.

"Jules." Name blossoms from a positive energy, out of place for the situation, the hospital and the planet. A husky woman marches into her biome. Weak light colors her teeth decaying gray as she pulls a wide grin before bending away. After few clicks the back half of the bed angles upwards. Maneuvers her body into sitting up without any of the actual work. "I'm Robin, remember?"

Vaguely remembers the middle-aged woman trying to provoke laughter from her humor dry throat. Her blue eyes, stained purple by inept light, twinkle in the darkness while plump cheeks round out in another full grin. Chopped ashen hair falls in wisps over her round face. "You're mandatory recovery time is almost up. Only half an hour to go."

"Great."

"Do you—" Robin taps a red cup to her bicep. A lid and a straw cap the top. When no solid motion to retrieve the cup exists, the nurse slits her eyes. The cup barrage continues, cold spitty plastic punching her bicep until she accepts it into an open palm. The water is freezing and although her tongue consists of carpet fibers, it offers no consolation. The cup is not the ornate china mug she wants to hold. "Do you want me to call down a psych consult for you?"

That grates out a chuckle, gurgles it around long strands of tasteless water. Around the drain of a sink. Straw pinches, bends and cracks between her forefinger and thumb. "No, that's fine."

"I know it seems like the worst thing in the world." Dry hands with cracked nails dig into the base of the bed. Reestablish the connection of covers to the bottom of the mattress. Ensure the blankets rest in peace. Guarantee she won't catch a cold or even a rickety hospital draft. The skin linking her toes slides with sweat. "But first trimester miscarriages usually happen because the fetus isn't viable. It's actually a blessing."

Straw drills into tap water and oblong cubes. Shakes and rattles. Chatters in her avoidance. What's the proper response? That knowing of its immanent doom makes losing it easier? Speed paints her to be a better prospective mother? She didn't even know it existed. Didn't even know until it didn't. "Yeah."

"Hey." Thick hand slaps her calf. Quakes her slumbering body. In her pelvis, muscles mumble in protest. Don't burst, or explode, or consume each other. Just twitch like a grumbling bear in hibernation before stopping. No trickle. "Your fiancé is still out there waiting."

Tap water floods off her tongue and back down the straw. The image of him in a worn armchair. Thrown over himself. Hands crested in concern he cultivates naturally and pesticide free. But jeans with globes of tacky blood sullied that image. Sponged away the excess concern and rammed it into his throat as a silencer. "Just tell him—"

"Oh no no no." Robin's hand snares hers. Warm and doughy, healthy and vibrant and all the things she's not. A mother. A proper woman. The cup exchange fumbles. Slithery porous surface glides from under her tips and crashes to the floor. But its form remains ill changed. Stays solid in bruises. Just semicircles on the floor. "I told him he could see you in five minutes almost an hour ago."

"So?"

"Honey, he's about to take out the orderly and break through this door." Cup collected in singularity, not in pieces, stands on the side table. Ice ticks within. Counting away thirty minutes before returning to a home that's not a home. Not as much as it could be. Collecting the bones of a favored china mug off the tiles. Spending the rest of her life hopscotching around the front of the sink. "You can see him scheming it."

"I just need some—"

"Time to be alone. And I gave it to you. Almost an hour." Returns to her origin in the jaws of the curtain. Playful kitten scrubs lack the ignition of calmness. Of comfort. Relates more to the ball of twine they beat. "It's up now."

Robin and her kits disappear. Will lead him like a mother goose waddling with seven or eight tiny goslings. He'll join her in the privacy curtain and together they'll birth an astounding silence. Carrying it swaddled with them into a house too big for two people. Let it gestate in a reverse awkwardness they were denied. Feed it until it burns her skin and the cold showers she's exposed to actually help. Maybe, eventually if they're lucky, if love predetermines concern, they might glue together the chips and shards of their relationship like a beloved mug.

The light shatters. Break in waves around a solid object. The blemished walls wash away. Shimmer with his shadow, shoulders and head carving mountaintops in sluggish defeat. Drags a new bag of clothing with him, a hunter with a recent kill. Never scrolls further than his half zipped coat. Not his face. The red capped eyes from the pain she sowed there. He gardens concern, her specialty is pain.

"Are you okay?" Words natural. Concern natural. String out from a barely tapped voice box. Hears the clicks of his throat. The exhalations from his nostrils drying his lips from heavy breathing he fights to smother. Remain calm; maybe think of the kittens which don't mean shit. Hand strangles the bag like a chicken neck when his marathon brain stumbles on this lap's mistake. "I mean, there weren't any complications, or—"

"No. It went fine."

Plastic bag thumps to the ground. Also keeps its solid form, although open edges threaten to spew socks and a sweater arm onto the floor. Circle the sink drain. The curtain shivers, suppresses a chuckle, an airy current picked up by the gym floor and tarred marks of his shoes. Sprints towards her, few feet of her curtained palace covered in mug fractions.

Flinches. Movement harsh, unabashed, unexpected. No little nursery rhyme leading up to Jack springing free from his prison. His concern obviously lets him notice, but he doesn't speak a single word. Doesn't halt his action or give any discomfort to feed hers. Just as he did when they patrolled only hours earlier and she shoved a Tylenol in her mouth.

Arms hoop her body. Encircle around her more times than necessary. Like a thrice ringed word in a sentence. Hands float over mounded columns until deflating the gown down to rib grooves. Cradles her head to his chest, weathered beaten. Tenderized.

"God, I was—" Lips stitch a kiss into her hair. A mechanical settling snaps within him. Like gears ground against each other and conveyer belts spun backwards until this moment. "I love you."

The paradox of outward love shocks her, fork to active outlet. The whirl from unable of any sense, to complete devotion and physical need frightens. The blame in this situation is all on her. All on her pelvis. All shoved up inside. If he doesn't portray disdain externally, then he builds it internally.

"I can't—I can't umm—" A single hand stigmas his chest. Heated with the flames of pain, of despair while he sat in a waiting room and brooded. A little pressure directs his body back, unclutching and unclenching her. Not suffocating in a reality as false as the beams of mango light. As the eyes of God themselves. "I can't deal with the—"

"Oh." Arms strike limp and pendulum deadened at his side. Sneakers yelp with an overcompensated step back. "Sorry. It's just that—the nurse kept telling me a few more minutes, and it was almost an hour."

Covers peel in difficulty. A repeated action, like twisting off an apple stem, until the cold atmosphere washes over her bare legs. Heels still furrowing rows into the mattress. "Maybe I'll be better once I'm at home. After what happened to me—"

Removes himself. A replay of the dishwasher. Implicitly told not to help, so busied himself with another branch of household tasks. Implicitly told not to touch, so he toddles away. Snatches the clothing grab bag off the floor. "Us."

"What?"

"It happened to us."

Legs gyrate from the edge of the bed. Work from suppression. From stirred emotion. From the gush of emptiness even though they plugged her flow. Justly unjust. Undone. Bumps sprout against reflective skin, budding from the carnal fuel, from the cold. "Really because I didn't see you in that operating room."

"I didn't mean—this affected both of us. We both have to deal with it. It's not just your—"

"I want to go home."

This is not a two player game.

* * *

Usually like this. A husk of a person punched into the corner of the couch. Blanket shawling angled knees. Feet stored behind to impede any side couch contact. Television a perilous game. Every channel rated M and unedited. From slasher films to nature shows of mother robins devotedly regurgitating masticated worms for her chicks. All deemed inappropriate, so his finger resolves to mash the channel arrow into the skull of the remote.

"How are you feeling?"

It's the same question. The exact same question, just disguised in different tones. Yelled from the kitchen. Mumbled in half sleep. Sighed in surrender. A question doused in concern and stuck on repeat like a button suffocating under his thumb.

"I'm fine." Answer mirrors the question. Only doesn't change. Speaks and rewinds her voice back into her throat. Saves it for the next time. Counts the beats between like heavy bristled storm clouds kneading above their house. In their house.

"Do you want any Tylenol? Or the heating pad?" Flow of evolving channels halts on a sitcom from two decades ago. Canned laughter playing offstage by an intern working a tape deck answers his question.

"I'm fine." An announcer assures the show is filmed in front of a live studio audience. Not corpses. Workplace antics of pratfalls and a broken coffee mug from the bungled attempt to stand ensue.

"You hungry? I'll run out and get you something. It's pretty late but somewhere has to be open." Remote clatters to the coffee table, his body springing up from the opposite end of the couch. The studio audience laughs at his sudden movement. So inappropriate when she hasn't wrinkled a finger to her palm since sitting down almost two hours ago.

"I'm fine."

"Jules, you need to eat."

"I'm fine."

"At least have something to drink, the doctor said to keep—"

"I'm going to bed." Body unhinges, knees and elbows creak as legs grow beneath her. Two bare pads graze the area rug comprised of earth toned flowers. Six pinnacled petals float to the floor in slow motion. She wasn't ready. Six domed discs dance to the floor. She didn't know.

"Jules—you don't—just stay." Aggravation blotches his skin. Inner turmoil collides with outward concern. Driving a bumper car in a stagnant position, reversing from corners he verbally blocked himself into. Can't show anger, it'll affect her negatively. Can't ask her questions, it affects her negatively. Doesn't realize that it's her affecting her. "Please just sit and stay with me."

"I know you feel like you need to do this with me because it's who you are, but you don't." Carpet yarn molds to the bottom of her feet. Mutes her step towards the stairs. Away from the mess she caused. The fragments of mug observing them from hidden kitchen crooks. "I need to do this alone. I'll eat tomorrow. I'll do the laundry tomorrow. I'll go back to work the next day and pretend nothing happened. Because that's who I am."

"I know who you are, how you get." Body lumbers in two steps towards her. She compensates two steps back. Some exotic relationship version of the pasodoble. They were never this exciting. Were just spectators in life as it scrolled by, as Natalie moved to England and maxed out her Visa, as Emily bought a ranch that wasn't actually for sale.

His brows slightly droop, the only indication of his distress. Eyes target her, narrow in determination. Classic evidence of his upset. Evidence of their squabbles. Kitchen wrung dances of verbal jousts where she investigates the kettle, the counter, the oven door that needs to be cleaned, anywhere but him because his scowling eyes flay. Hold the disappointment which so many others have imbued to her.

"I took tomorrow off. We need to talk. You can't act like nothing—"

"You took tomorrow off? We both can't have tomorrow off. What did—"

"I just told Sarge an emergency came up."

"You shouldn't have told him anything."Angry. Beyond that valley. Furious. Blood pressure rises and for the first time in two hours a dull cramp creeps its way through her pelvis. Legless, it grabs with fists, tears at her insides to accelerate its motion. The idea of shame. Of ill childbearing shame. Of pre-wedding consummating china using shame. The pity. The shoulder claps and puppy eyes and fuck it all because not one of them knows. "This wasn't an emergency. By the time I knew what was going on, no one could help."

"Stop. Just stop." Anger screams out in the empty cavern of their living room. Tidy and neat with perfect angles and dustless curtains. Empty with just the two of them. Anger echoes, reverberates off the human stalagmite. Hand forms from crushed stone and soul. Face disintegrates from the slack mask worn all night. "You're not alone in this."

"I know you think you're part of this. That it happened to you too and you may be right." Pain shudders inside. Fangs peeling the paint off of rotten walls. No flinch. No wince. Not even a double blink. Fingers can't tap melodiously against hardened shell of her navel to assuage a tremor. Touching forces a memory. Remembering what she had for a single kitchen tile. "But this happened to me. It happened in me, Sam. And I should have known."

"Sweetheart, this isn't your fault." Suspends his hand midair, but won't tread further. Afraid to burn down her singed wick. So near he gains second degree burns. The comfort runs mutually. Needs to hold her to appease his thoughts of loss. Hold her and sigh into her neck and know she's rooted despite her hollow interior.

But she can't offer him any kind of consolation right now. Can't nurture him, while she decomposes. Can't nurture a fucking thing but the negative pin pricks stabbing at the layer of skin puckering blood. Shoulders hunch into a mock draft. The hand sinks predicting her trail. Her habits uniform and maintained. "I'm going to bed."

Only the audience cheers her decent.

* * *

3:23am, the perfect palindromic time. No one bothered to twist the horizontal blinds shut and through the slits clumps of snow shed from above. Streetlights splay the shadow puppet of changing sea snowflakes on night stained Santorini walls. Dalmatian spots scramble across the window stage like blotted notes on sheet music.

Her body outlines her edge of the bed. Toe wiggles in free, unpatrolled sheets. Downy and laundry fresh sloshing around her greasy body. Her hospital stained body. Her hemorrhaging body. Tops of her thighs ache from strain, from too many seats, too many beds. Pelvis neutral, a slumbering dragon on a powder keg. Back tight, a construction of iron and stitched with five pound weights.

Back to him. A slight snore gurgles from his throat. Endears because she knows sleep didn't come easy. The shifting rainbow of her emotions labels him brave by crawling into bed next to her. Probably never occurred to him to seek rest elsewhere.

Pose mimicked, head encroaching on the territory of her pillow, but not invading. The gap between them reserved for large fights, for seasonal flus though mucus, snot and fevers don't stop them. But his hand disturbs. Tossed to her hip like a caught carp. Unconsciously done from routine. Cups her pelvis. Hand and fingers tender and warm on a brutalized region. Growing naturally towards her body as flowers angle to sunlight. Growing where nothing grows.

Index and thumb against his middle finger create tongs. Plucks his hand, the heat, the contact, the transfer of love, away. Drains from under his slumbering hold. Feet touch the weather chilled floor as the odorous stench of an antique boiler sputters on. His hand holds her phantom body, caresses her waning heat as it mingles with the dry stench.

The blizzard whitewashes their bedroom. Aids her in retrieving clothing. Friction flawless in dresser drawers. Just once he mutters in sleep, shimmies closer to her side of the bed but never fully wakes. Only fragments of consciousness, as he attains fragments of what happened to her, to them today.

Coddling a bundle of clothes to her chest, she pads softly to the bathroom. Bars the door behind. Doesn't bother the light. Nothing she needs to see. Wants to see. Doesn't already know in detail. A few gossamer minutes pass. Muted in a bound enclosure, blanketed in gray.

Undresses for the third time. Baggy cotton sags onto intricate tiled floors. Too small for full feet. Fragments of clear and opaque and shining tile, glimmers despite the gloom. Feet touch the freezing porcelain tub, and she mans the shower curtain. Rings clatter against the rod in prehistoric recoil. An eerie clarity to the squared modern design. Water spots clamor and shatter. Dirty little pre-formed containers holding twelve weeks worth of secrets.

Switches the faucet on. The gradation of blue to red appears as a single black frown in the low light. Instincts tuck the temperature in the center. The middle of hot and cold. A perfect median birthed from pieces of both. Knows about the absence of hot water. Brain chides her hands while body prepares for the freezing rain. But the pouring water from the overhanging head begins to steam around her. Massages and relaxes her skin with a steady motion. Icy porcelain sunbathes, retaining heat.

Both her hands brace the wall figured with the tap and head. Water curls down her parched back muscles. Streams over her breasts and convulsing pelvis. Mixes and creates brown ribbons of blood circling the drain. He fixed the water heater. And she starts to cry.

Sobs in hysteric charades for several minutes. The natural flow of water drowns her until actions strangle. Devoid of tears, another emptiness. Washes and jumps out. Feet on iridescent tiles twinkling like stolen stars and baby teeth. Uses an old towel stuffed in ratty retreat in the corner of the cupboard. Craggy in dust from long agos. From renovations of rooms when rooms didn't exist, he didn't exist; she as she is now didn't exist. They didn't exist. No need to wreck everything.

Sweatpant drawstrings clatter against void counter. Mother of pearl in the snow dome of second hand steam. Sweatshirt irons over her arms, her breasts, her chest, her stomach, under her navel to barren autumn soils dehydrated to thick sand. Only blood runs in rivers.

Still asleep, though less content than before. Shadows lap at his brow angled in displeasure, in loss. Hand paws at the clear, cool pool of her wrinkles. Wrenches in an unconscious connection as she toes by the foot of the bed. Again he never fully wakes. Never fully involved.

Growing pains absent from the stairs as her hand surfs the rail. Employs serpentine banister as a seeing eye dog to lead her over repeated ridges blended into a supercontinent. Heel slips only once, thumps the arch of her foot to solid wood. Broken vessels bleed under the skin, feed a nasty bruise. There might be a piece of china between her toes.

Kitchen hums in absent nighttime routines. The fridge motor whirs with the severity of a motorboat. Fan finally ceasing with a heavy click. The sink drips, drops plumping and bursting forth to the metallic basin sheen she can't approach. Wants tea, in a mug. A geometrically trimmed flower containing a cup full of comfort. Wants to hold the heated ceramic to her pelvis. Think between the strands of shame and guilt buzzing like locusts that there are other mugs. The infinitesimal amount of optimism doesn't bring the idea of a smile, just reproduces more guilt and shame. Oh she so easily forgets.

Feet thud from above. Hit the floor maybe with body unattached. Listens to him pound the floor while darting out of the room, and down the stairs in a fury of limbs. Limbs entangled in an exam room where he marched and pivoted with haste. With fear. The fear of her removal. The same now, though death isn't the means.

Doesn't notice her inky body swaying with the aftershock of removal. She didn't get a choice. He slides to a stuttering stop at the base of the stairs. Sweatpants loosely tied and a half zipped sweater crowning at his shoulder. Stumbles forward, hand slapping the ground in a misguided game as he scoops up his shoes, running shoes for a blizzard. Targets an armchair by the front door where he abandoned his coat.

Vision narrows at him, his bumbling comic act sans a live studio audience to cheer him on. Heavy panting never heard in drills, or during hot calls. Prods his own body for his keys. Lips puff car muffler guilt and he curses softly to himself. Each extra second stapled to his back. An extra bag of sand for him to lug.

"What are you doing?"

Voice thrives over the mechanical kitchen commentary. Keys smack the floor in a start; body bends with her raspy tone. Scans the stomach of the house, and truly grins when he finds her. "You're—you're here." Clamps his hands around the split sides of his coat and shrugs out of it. Lobs it to the armchair, exhalations louder than his response as he crouches to retrieve his keys. "I thought you left."

"Why would I leave?"

A dangerous question to ask. Tensions stretch thin and even the strongest thread eventually breaks. Not everything is built to last the trials of an entire lifetime. Sharing a stark mood, they cut the bullshit and sarcasm and end up digging deep to create new scars.

"I don't know." But he doesn't. The euphoric rush over false concern dulls his stinging remarks. Low lidded eyes with sleep dewed lines and a shapeless smile. Steps no longer to a ragtime beat. Just leans on the opposite end of the kitchen counter. Three white stools in neutral territory. "I think I was having a bad dream and I woke up, and you weren't there."

Calmness infectious like the plague. Just the way he observes her, the way he stares at her with such intense love. The same as this morning, and the day before, the week before, the last five years. A wholeness among nothing. "I wanted a cup of tea."

Body towers away from the counter. Old concern filed away, new concern postmarked and a brief explanation written in triplicate. Washes his face with a new expression, wider eyes sparking awake with a montage of horrible twenty-four hour memories. "Do you want me to make it for you?"

No cultivates pestering which cultivates a fight on blame. Spins her in a mug thrown from the counter to the floor and exploding in fireworks. Cements her to a kitchen tile squarely perfect in its bridal gown whiteness where she learned the worst of the world. Locks her in the prison of simple intuition moments. Where pants are a little too tight. Where food smells a little too aromatic. Where she got sick a few times, but never consecutive in days or weeks and there was a flu going around and he still slept with his arms draped around her with love and then concern.

Tears rehydrated from the shower drip down her face and share their rhythm with the tap. Sprout from her eyes, froth in the corners, and stain her cheeks red. Don't taste of salt, taste of nothing. Of nothingness the only thing her body cultivates.

"How can you do this?"Already on a crash collision to comfort her. But her elbows branch from her cheeks, intercept his arms, his embrace. Sniffles into her damp palm cast misty in unflavored tears and discharge. Holds the ambiance of a rainforest. "You blame me."

"Jules, would—" Craves her again. Fallen mighty oak desperately aiming for the embracing arms of his family. Of those he loves. But she dodges his pawing hand, so needy with her sheet wrinkles, with her leftover heat. "Would you listen to me? I don't blame you. I could never blame you."

"Then why didn't you answer?"

"Answer what?"

"I asked if you blamed me and—"

"Jules, I just got told that we were going to have a baby. This beautiful baby who would gurgle and hold my hand and smile. A baby with you." Buries a cautious step in his words. Nears her clasping the curved island end eroded by years of lapping waves and kitchen squabbles. "And in the same sentence I was told it was dead. I mean I kind of knew but—just hearing it."

"I should have done more." Directs her words to the hollow carved at her center. To the presence which lived there for ten to twelve weeks. A little fragment of intense love. "I should have known."

"You don't think I feel guilty too?" Waver in his speech fluctuates as his hand accidentally teeters a stool. Rocks it on four stable legs. "Everything that's happened at work? The rappelling, the tackling, the drills. All the guns aimed at you."

"It's not the—"sight of tile aisle between island and counter beheads her sentence. The site of mug bombing. A slip of pain riddled fingers destroying something dear to her. Expects to find grimaces of the mug, a disk, a handle, but nothing glows in the early light of snowy dawn. Nothing glows because the harassing tile fled. A square of dull uneven concrete stamps its place. He ripped up the tile.

"It's not the same? I went to a bookstore to try to find a way to deal with this Jules and do you know where they put the books on child loss? Right next to pregnancy and babies." Radiating love pocketed in his pupils flickers like lights before a power outage. Wrestled and displayed under a plate of glass. Cloud spotted glass. A shake of his head causes the first tear to plummet. "I thought what kind of sadist runs this bookstore right before I broke down."

"I'm sorry."

"Don't."

In a mosaic of mug fragments, of kitchen and bathroom tiles her imagination usurps. In babbling and geriatric newborn smiles. In breastfeeding and burping. In nursery paints and scarcely attended baby showers. In frilly pink dresses and blue jean overalls. In tiny hats and tinier socks. In contractions and ultrasounds. In a ubiquitous gush of blood.

Pelvis undulates in a pitiful attempt at pain. Nails and teeth filed down but still so vengeful because she should have done better by it. "I didn't—"

Aims with sniper senses, emotionally distraught with their scripted conversations. Catches her on the first pounce. Detains her, weighted hands on her biceps while the filmstrip of melancholia chatters through her mind. Reels her to his chest, half tucked to bed by a stuck zipper. "We didn't know Jules."

Not restraints, or iron shackles bolted to her wrists and ankles to plunge her into the ocean, seep her into a crevice. Hand weaves to her neck, the small of her back and straightens her cramping, corroding body. The touch, the contact of something not metal, or cotton, or sterile cleanses her skin like boiling shower water.

Hand blossoms, vines up his shoulder and clutches the back of his neck. Thumb traveling the naked trench behind his ear. Lips taste hers, just brush, a smudge. Dip to her cheek peckish for tears flavored with air. Hot wet face flattens to his numb chest. Calms her shallow sobs by ghosting his fingers through her damp hair. Nuzzles his head to the top of hers to help her ignore the pungent surges in her pelvis.

"We didn't know."


End file.
